The sad chronicle of our attempt to see fireworks last night: T and I were coming home from our annual July 4th family barbecue (it's my grandma's birthday, so we always spend the holiday with my family -- it's one of two non-optional family days, the other being Thanksgiving) when R gave us a call. He and S were in the city, did we want to meet up for fireworks? We both really like fireworks, and traffic was light enough that it looked like we'd make it back from Santa Rosa in time, so we said sure. They met us at our place, we bundled up and caught Muni, we took it to the closest station, and then made the one mile walk toward the wharf. There was some fog, but it looked to be fairly high, so we didn't think it would be a problem. We took up our usual position about five blocks from the official fireworks zone, and waited for the display off the end of Pier 39 to begin.

And waited, and waited, and waited. Eventually we started seeing some lights flashing and hearing some booms, but it was all behind trees and not from the angle we were expecting. Was this a different fireworks display? They usually have a couple, from different areas of Fisherman's Wharf. After a few minutes, the stream of people reversed direction -- they had all been walking towards the wharf, but now they were pouring back the other direction, marching past us and getting in line for shuttle busses. Much speculation followed -- had they given up on getting good seats? Was the fog thicker down on the wharf? Were the Pier 39 fireworks canceled? Did theses folks know something we didn't? Finally, S stopped someone and asked why everyone was leaving. "Too foggy" was the response. We waited and debated for a few minutes, then decided to give it up as a lost cause and head out. Half an hour of walking later, we were at The Cheesecake Factory for a late dinner.

Oh well, there's always next year. I feel bad for leading R and S astray with our street corner, though -- if we'd gone a few blocks further we would have been able to see more than random colors lighting the sky.